[
    {
        "id": 207401,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-1975",
        "page_number": 169,
        "title": "RAS-1975",
        "content_text": "CAPTIVE SURGEON IN HONG KONG\n\n161\n\ntroops, in my opinion, put up an excellent resistance from the static strong points which were the mainstay of the defence plan. They were pitted against a numerically superior and much more mobile enemy and no blame should be placed on them for the fact that our resistance was broken in under three weeks, nowhere near the ninety days originally judged to be desirable. These views imply no criticism of the defence plan for the circumstances of the Colony decided the plan. The defence was further prejudiced by the huge population of non-combatants in Kowloon and Victoria. Given the conditions under which our troops had to fight, I believe that our defeat could never have been avoided except by avoiding hostilities altogether. I believe we could have accepted any loss of face which a pre-war withdrawal, leaving only internal security forces, would have entailed. Having said that, however, the troops thereby released from Hong Kong would probably have been used in Singapore and almost certainly would not have changed the outcome there. One can only sympathise with the Governor and the G.O.C. and their staffs in their task of defending a Colony whose fate was sealed long before the fighting and they and the troops did their jobs well. The story unfolded slowly but inexorably after the style of a Greek tragedy.\n\n26 DECEMBER 1941–7 AUGUST 1942\n\nThe Japanese were slow to move in to take control of the hospital though they did concentrate our fighting troops at once and moved them to prisoner of war camps. For years I wondered why the hospital and indeed the whole of Hong Kong was spared the large scale rape, murder and looting which seemed to be the reward for Japanese troops upon the capture of large cities in China. The case of Nanking in December 1937 was the best known of these, when the city was given over to the victorious Japanese troops and for some weeks suffered on a huge scale.\n\nIt was not until I read the Official History of the War Against Japan that the probable explanation appeared in Volume 1. The Japanese attack on Hong Kong was made by the 38 Division reinforced by additional troops. The division had three regiments, the 228, 229 and 230 Infantry Regiments. The 228 regiment was transferred from Hong Kong to Davao on 18 January 1942 and thence to Amboina and Timor. The 229 regiment and one battalion",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1975.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 211067,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-1987",
        "page_number": 128,
        "title": "RAS-1987",
        "content_text": "103\n\n5.55 acres) for a Cemetery for Protestant foreigners and the right to construct a Cemetery was confirmed by the Spanish Government by a further Superior Decreto of August 30th, 1864. The lease was for a period of 90 years from May 2nd, 1863 at an annual rental of one hundred Philippine pesos (P), (presently Stg. 2.50).\n\nIn 1907 the area of the Cemetery was reduced to allow for the construction of an electric street car line from Pasig to Manila and the rent for the remaining 16,811 sq metres (4.15 acres) was reduced to P85.00. Road widening took another 469 sq metres in June 1941, shortly before the Japanese occupation during which the destruction of the boundary wall added to the inevitable neglect. Nevertheless, P429.30 back rental for the period of the war had to be paid in January 1946. In 1947 the lease was extended until December 31st, 1987.\n\nThe five hundred odd burials give an interesting insight into the variety of life amongst foreigners who took up living halfway across the world in these lovely islands.\n\nMostly British, with Germans the second largest national group, they included master mariners from Liverpool and Plymouth, seamen from Nova Scotia, Belfast and Hamburg; businessmen from London and Lancashire, a Parisian shopkeeper, an operatic impressario from Milan, engineers on the British owned Manila Railroad, a diplomat who had served in the American Consular Service for forty-five years, and many children. Jews were also buried in the Cemetery, as were Japanese, although all these remains were removed to Japan during the occupation in 1942. Perhaps the most interesting burial was Prince Ludwig Zu Lowenstein-Wertheim-Freudenberg who went to Manila as a military observer during the revolution against American occupation and was killed by a stray bullet during fighting in Battangas in March 1899.\n\nThere were 93 recorded British deaths in the Philippines during the Second World War, mostly priests and civilians, from natural causes, privation, enemy action and execution by Japanese and by Filipino collaborators. These people were buried in many different places including Baguio Cathedral, Cebu, Davao, La Loma,",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1987.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/rx919b522",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 212387,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-1990",
        "page_number": 329,
        "title": "RAS-1990",
        "content_text": "306\n\nthe San Bernadino Strait and searched the east coasts of Samar and Mindanao.\n\nBy the 24th December the Sphinx had arrived in Davao and made preparations for an eastward search through the Caroline Islands. Following fruitless enquiries in Palau from the local chieftains, the Sphinx churned her way further east through the myriad islets and atolls.\n\nBy the time HMS Sphinx had reached the Enderby atolls, Cmdr Brown had begun to lose hope of finding the Norna survivors. One last possibility lay ahead of him. Truk (now known as Chuuk), was the group of islands closest to St Augustine on the intended route of the Norna's castaways. In the early morning of the 3rd March 1862, HMS Sphinx eased her way through Truk's 100 mile circular coral fringe.\n\nNo sooner had they entered the lagoon than they saw an European style boat being rowed frantically towards them. The four lascar occupants scrambled up to the Sphinx's deck and explained they were from the shipwrecked barque Norna. They also told Brown that the rest of the crew were being held captive as slaves on various other islands in the group; they themselves had managed to escape.\n\nAfter a minor skirmish with the natives, HMS Sphinx rescued all the castaways from the Norna save for one who had died a few months earlier from the treatment meted out by the Trukese. It had been all but a year since the Norna was wrecked on the reefs of Oroluk Lagoon.\n\nOn the 19th March 1862, HMS Sphinx set course for Guam where they arrived six days later. After 10 days of rest and recreation, Brown set the Sphinx on course for Hong Kong and came to anchor close by the guardship, HMS Princess Charlotte, which was anchored not far from today's Kellet Island.\n\nHMS Sphinx had more than successfully acquitted herself in her endeavours. She had sailed and steamed nearly 6,000 miles through the little known waters of the Western Pacific in search of a crew who might or might not have survived. However, the naval authorities in Hong Kong firmly believed there was more than a fair chance of",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1990.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/d79206299",
        "rank": 0
    }
]